(Originally published in 1865. This volume from the Cornel...)
Originally published in 1865. This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies. All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume.
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(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. This text refers to the Bibliobazaar edition.
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(George Derby was a soldier,an engineer,a cartographer,a h...)
George Derby was a soldier,an engineer,a cartographer,a humorist, and an artist. His life was short. He died when he was 38 years old.He interacted with Robert E. Lee,General Winfield Scott,William Tecumseh Sherman, Jefferson Davis, and Ulysses S. Grant. The last book Abraham Lincoln read was by Derby (aka John Phoenix). His classmates were Stonewall Jackson,George McClellan, and George Pickett.He built 5 lighthouses on the Alabama Gulf Coast. He explored the Gulf of California and the Colorado River. He surveyed the Sacramento Valley and Camp Far West. He was in charge of the first engineering project west of the Mississippi.He was a hero of the Mexican war.He is buried at West Point.His humor influenced Mark Twain.His antics influenced Lillie Coit.
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(This book is a replica, produced from digital images of t...)
This book is a replica, produced from digital images of the original. It was scanned at the University of Toronto Libraries and may contain defects, missing
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George Horatio Derby was born on April 3, 1823 in Dedham, Massachusetts, United States. He was the son of John Barton and Mary (Townsend) Derby, and the descendant of a long line of New England ancestors. His father was known for his oddity of character and his literary bent, both of which he transmitted to his son.
Derby attended school at Dedham, and then lived for a time at Concord, Massachusetts, working in a store, reading voraciously, and already displaying his eccentric qualities.
Entering the United States Military Academy on July 1, 1842, he graduated four years later, standing seventh in a class of fifty-nine. At the Academy he established a reputation as a wit and notorious practical joker which remained with him throughout life.
Derby was first appointed brevet second lieutenant of ordnance, but was almost immediately transferred to the Topographical Engineers, with which corps he served thenceforth.
After a brief period spent in the survey of New Bedford Harbor, the outbreak of the Mexican War gave him a taste of active campaigning. He served at the siege of Vera Cruz, and with distinction at Cerro Gordo, where he was severely wounded. For gallant and meritorious conduct in that battle he was brevetted first lieutenant. After recovering from his wound he served in the Topographical Bureau (1847 - 48), and on exploring expeditions in Minnesota Territory (1848 - 49).
Early in 1849 he was sent to California. According to a tradition, which has at least the value of illustrating his character, his transfer to the Pacific Coast was a kind of banishment resulting from too great flippancy in a report addressed to the secretary of war.
Except for a brief term of duty in Texas (1852), he remained on the Pacific Coast until 1856. He conducted three exploring expeditions in California (in the gold country, in the San Joaquin Valley, along the Colorado River), and wrote the official reports describing them, managing to enliven even such dry-as-dust material with sudden outbursts of his burlesque humor.
Since 1850 he had been writing sketches; in 1853 he was sent to San Diego, and there almost by accident became famous.
His friend, J. J. Ames, editor of the San Diego Herald, left town temporarily, putting Derby in unofficial charge of the paper. In the course of a few issues the latter transformed a sober, Democratic, smalltown weekly into a riotous conglomeration of wit, burlesque, and satire, devoted to the Whig party.
All California laughed, and Derby’s outbursts were even reprinted in the East. He became immediately the state wit, and humorous stories without number were credited to him. The founders of The Pioneer; or California Monthly Magazine (San Francisco, 1854) solicited his aid, and introduced him to their readers as one “whom not to know argues oneself unknown. ”
Much of his best work appeared in this short-lived monthly. In 1855 Ames, with consent of the author, selected some of the sketches, and the next year published Phoenixiana; or Sketches and Burlesques, a volume which became immediately, and remained for a generation, immensely popular. The pseudonym, John Phoenix, was in this case an advertisement rather than a disguise, since Derby was commonly known by that appellation or by his nickname, “Squibob. ”
Derby continued in the army, regarding writing only as an avocation.
In 1856 he was transferred to the East, and there wrote other humorous sketches, some of which were published in book form as The Squibob Papers (1865). He was promoted to the rank of captain on July 1, 1860.
In the previous year, while working as light-house engineer in Florida he had suffered a sunstroke which, reacting upon his already eccentric personality, deranged his mind. After December 20, 1859, he was on sick leave, and a year and a half later he died in New York City.
Derby’s writings are important as representing one of the earliest developments of the so-called American, or Western, style of humor.
(George Derby was a soldier,an engineer,a cartographer,a h...)
(This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curat...)
(This book is a replica, produced from digital images of t...)
(Originally published in 1865. This volume from the Cornel...)
As a personality Derby was unusually interesting; his hoaxes, and his ready wit under cover of extreme gravity were for many years the subject of reminiscences in California, and in the army.
Derby married Mary Ann Coons of St. Louis.
